Why Obama Won’t Go to Congress

Jack Goldsmith seems shocked by Obama’s willingness to launch a unilateral and unauthorized attack on Syria:

This is very dangerous territory for the President. Forget the Constitution for a moment. Why won’t the President pay the same respect to American democracy that David Cameron paid to British democracy?

The answer is that he doesn’t think he needs to go to Congress for the same reason that he didn’t think he needed to do that two years ago. If this White House could concoct an absurd legal theory that eight months of bombing another country didn’t constitute “hostilities,” is it likely to think that a week of cruise missile strikes requires Congressional approval? Obama certainly forgot the Constitution two years ago, and for a lot longer than a moment, and he appears to be ready to forget it again. He does this because he can, and because he assumes that no one will hold him accountable for it. It’s only “dangerous territory” if there are serious consequences, and Obama’s experience from two years ago tells him that there won’t be. In other words, he won’t pay that respect because he assumes he can get away with not paying it, and he has yet to be proven wrong.

If Obama doesn’t think he is legally required to go to Congress, wouldn’t it still make sense politically to involve Congress and get their backing for his attack? It might seem so, but the case for the attack is so weak that it wouldn’t withstand much public scrutiny, much less debate in both houses. Because the proposed military action is supposed to be brief and limited, Obama probably sees going to Congress as a useless headache and unnecessary complication. Of course, it shouldn’t matter whether he feels like doing it. Unlike Cameron, he is obliged to do this when he plans to initiate hostilities against another state. It is up to members of Congress and the public to make him fulfill that obligation. Unless that happens, Obama will go ahead with the attack as if Congress is irrelevant because it will have proven itself to be exactly that.

Hide 23 comments

23 Responses to Why Obama Won’t Go to Congress

I think one should admit upfront that the leadership of Congress is fully and completely complicit in this, as it was two years ago. Congress is willing to go along with this because it generally wants it done, and is happy to avoid any responsibility should anything go wrong.

Suppose I go speeding past a speed trap, and the cop doesn’t pull out to give me a ticket. Yes, I’ve still broken the law. But no one cares that I am not paying a fine — and indeed, I’m not even legally obligated to pay a fine.

That’s more or less where we are. One of the houses of Congress is controlled by the opposition, and the leadership of that house has the complete ability to bring on both a debate, and an authorization. (Any member could introduce a resolution authorizing force, including authorizing very limited force, for example.) If they wanted it, it would be happening.

Congress must hold this man accountable. The congressional oath of office requires it.

“I do solemnly swear that I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic; that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same; that I will take this obligation freely, without any mental reservation or purpose of evasion, and that I will well and faithfully discharge the duties of the office on which I am about to enter. So help me God.”

We’ve let him get away with bailing out the big banks with our money, expanding the surveillance state to unprecedented size and scope, and now once again preparing to use military force unilaterally – without consulting Congress.

This event is a tremendous opportunity for us all to make a stand and put an historic brake on presidential power to make war without consent. If Obama’s botching of his Syria policy neutralizes the war hawks through 2016, wow – what a win for the good guys. But keep an eye on Hillary Clinton. She needs to be called out on this too and she is being awfully quiet.

In virtually every commitment of U.S. troops since 1973, including the Iran hostage rescue attempt (1980), military exercises in Honduras (1983), the participation of U.S. marines in a multinational force in Lebanon (1982–1983), invasion of Grenada (1983), bombing of Libya (1986), invasion of Panama (1989), humanitarian mission to Somalia (1992–1994), and bombing of Kosovo (1999), members of Congress complained that the president had not fully complied with the War Powers Resolution.

Tellingly, the comment is “members of Congress complained”. As you point out, Congress– across time, across parties– doesn’t want to do anything but reserve the right to complain.

Your argument that Obama will see going to Congress as a needless complication makes one heroic assumption: that Obama really wants to strike. If, as it seems from some things, he is reluctant to strike, going to Congress is a first rate way to gain political cover for not doing so.

Re: wjca “If, as it seems from some things, he is reluctant to strike, going to Congress is a first rate way to gain political cover for not doing so.”

The key point is that Obama is making an internal trade between his ears. Barack may not want to strike out at Syria, but as an Imperial President, he values his future (extra-constitutional) autonomy even more. The last thing he wants is Congress weighing in on the Nation’s business, a responsibility which he (and his sycophantic Power Elite stooges) covet as uniquely their own.

Better to heave hardheartedly some cruise missiles obliterating hapless Syrians (USA! USA!) than implicitly acknowledge that global death and destruction is not the unique purview of the latest narcissistic nitwit to occupy the Oval Office.

I live in the People’s Republic of VT, where support for Obama has been about 70%. I don’t know a single person standing with Obama in his desire to attack Syria. By his clumsy overreach, Obama has broken the spell that enthralled so many good people on the left. Attack or no attack, I don’t see how he retains credibility after this. The whole world is laughing at him.

DanielOney wrote:
August 31, 2013 at 1:41 am
Neusdadt and Schlesinger documented the inexorable, if gradual expansion of presidential power. What institution or system can roll that back?
end quote

Well, there is the Constitution.

In truth, though – and I, too, think intervention will only make a bad situation even worse – what will Congress do? The Republicans have made clear they are willing to do unlimited damage to the people of this country as long as a black man is in the White House.
The Democrats are only one tiny bit better, if only because Reid is too spineless to actually be as bad as the Republicans.

However, you asked and I gave you the answer. As TP Voter showed us, we’ve reached a point of polarization in our country at which I suspect congress can’t act, even if they wanted to.

“Hillary Clinton had been making a good bit of noise about American intervention in Syrian civil war.”

The worst Secretary of State in living memory and perhaps ever. We’ll be living with the consequences of her incompetence and venality for a very long time. But it is not inconceivable that Kerry’s diarrhea of the mouth may help him wrest away Clinton’s dubious laurel.